n! Just so much and no more, that was the secret of happiness. Give
with the mind and the heart; but keep always one inviolable sanctity of
the spirit--of the buried self beneath the self.

The streets were almost deserted; and as the car went on, Corinna
thought that she had never seen the city look so fresh and charming.
Through the long green vista of the trees, there was a shimmer of silver
air, and wrapped in this sparkling veil, she saw the bronze statues and
the ardent glow of the sunset. Everything at which she looked was
steeped in a wonderful golden light; and this light seemed to come, not
from the burning horizon, but from the happiness that flooded her
thoughts. She saw the world again as she had seen it in her first youth,
suffused with joy that was like the vivid freshness of dawn. The long
white road, the arching trees, the glittering dust, the spring flowers
blooming in gardens along the roadside, the very faces of the people who
passed her; all these things at which she looked were illuminated by
this radiance which seemed, in some strange way, to shine not without
but within her heart. "It is too beautiful to last," she said to
herself in a whisper. "It is youth, more beautiful even than the
reality, come back again for an hour--for one little hour before it goes
out for ever."

Then, because it seemed safer as well as wiser to be practical, to
discourage wild dreaming, she tried to direct her thoughts to
insignificant details. Yet even here that rare golden light penetrated
to the innermost recesses of her mind; and each drab uninteresting fact
glittered with a fresh interest and charm. "I forgot to order that
cretonne for the porch," she thought disconnectedly, in an endeavour to
conciliate the Fates by pretending that life was as commonplace as it
had always been. "That black background with the blue larkspur is
pretty--and I must have the porch furniture repainted the blue-green
that they do so well in Italy. That reminds me that Patty must be the
belle of the dance in her green dress. I shall see that she has no lack
of partners--at least I can manage that;--if I cannot make her happy. I
am sorry for the child--if only Stephen--but, no--I left the book I was
reading in the shop. What was the name of it? Silly and sentimental! Why
will people always write things they don't mean and know are not true
about love? Yes, the black background with the blue larkspur was the
best that I saw. I wonder wha